by Zack Wyatt
“I might be alone out here in the middle of this swamp, but I’m not a woman of easy virtue, Mr. Sands. I suggest you keep your hands to yourself. If you don’t, you’ll be staring down the wrong end of this old musket!”
Sands held up both his hands and shook his head, while beaming the lovely, young blonde a wide smile. He had only meant to squeeze her hand in a thank-you. “No offense meant, Ange—uh ... Ann.”
The tension eased from her face. “None taken, if we have the way of things straight between us.”
Sands nodded. “I’ve got it straight.”
“Good,” she said, moving back beside the bed. “There was another fellow you mentioned in your fever dreams, a Dub Frank.”
“Ferris, Dub Ferris,” Sands corrected, then listened while Ann told how she had gone back and found Dub’s body.
“I couldn’t leave him like that, so I dug a grave back among the pines,” she said. “I said a few scriptures over him. Nothing fancy, just some verses Ma made me memorize when I was a kid.”
“Thank you, Dub was a good man.” Sands’ thoughts wove back to Professor Peoples and his two friends, Cotton and Pumpkin. “I’m sure Dub would have appreciated knowing a beautiful woman said the last words over him.”
Ann’s eyebrow arched high over her right eye at the mention of her beauty, and her grip tightened on the rifle, but she didn’t move away. “You two in trouble with a family around here, or maybe the law?”
“Rangers,” Sands answered, then quickly explained all that had happened.
When he finished, Ann thoughtfully pursed her lips and walked back to the gut-covered window to peer outside. When she spoke, her voice came as little more than a whisper. “That tall, mountain of a man you said the others called Cotton didn’t happen to have a blue birthmark on the left side of his neck, did he?” Her fingers crept to the left side of her face to touch just below her ear and move down her neck.
“Ran down beneath his shirt collar,” Sands answered. “Do you know him?”
“My brother,” Ann replied, never turning from the window. “Pa called him Cotton Blue because of his light hair and that birthmark.”
Sands stared at his angel, recalling Cotton’s cold eyes, orbs that were devoid of even a hint of human emotion. He was unable to picture the two as brother and sister—not an angel and a hell-spawned demon.
“No wonder the Haskells have been so stirred up these past couple of weeks.” Ann’s hands tightened about the rifle. “They must’ve got word Cotton was back in this area.”
“Haskells?”
Ann’s gaze lowered, focusing on the cabin’s earthen floor. “Ol’ man Tye Haskell and his four sons live on the north shore of Lake Sabine. There used to be five Haskell boys. About a year and a half ago, Cotton Blue and Bo Haskell got into a fight over a jug of corn liquor. Bo was killed—his neck snapped—and Tye swore he’d wipe every Sharp he could find off the face of the earth ...”
She paused, then looked at Sands for a long silent moment before she told how her brother had fled into Louisiana on their father’s advice. “Pa thought he could square things with the old man. Took the boat to the Haskells a day after the fight to talk with Tye. I found the boat the next morning tied to our pier. Pa was inside—throat slit.”
“What about you?” Sands’ mind churned: Cotton Blue had fled into Louisiana. He edge the kernel of an idea to the back of his thoughts. “Why haven’t the Haskells come after you?”
“Ol’ man Tye is keeping me here—thinks Cotton Blue will eventually come back.” She explained that she had tried to leave the swamps several times after her father’s murder only to find her path blocked by the Haskells and their guns. “That old man is mean, and his four sons do exactly what their pa says. For the past couple weeks, they’ve come poking around here at night. Had to run them off with a couple of shots about the time I found you in the swamp.”
She looked back out the window. “Guess they’re trying to get a glimpse of Cotton Blue before making a move. Tye wouldn’t want to kill his bait—at least not until I served my purpose. Lucky the old water rat doesn’t realize that my brother never gave a hoot or holler about Pa or me. If he did, I’d be dead by now.”
There was a twinge of pain in Ann’s voice when she spoke of Cotton Blue that Sands discerned. “But you care, don’t you, Ann?”
Her eyes rolled downward to stare at the floor again. Sands saw her breast give a labored heave.
“Hard not to care. Cotton Blue’s blood. Before Ma died, we were close like a brother and sister should be. But when Ma died, something got twisted sideways in him, something he couldn’t get out, something that festered and ...”
Her voice trailed off, and she rubbed a hand across her face. Abruptly her head rose, and she looked at her patient. “None of this concerns you. You’ve got problems of your own—like getting back on your feet.”
And finding your brother, Sands thought, but left unspoken. “Maybe I can talk with this Tye Haskell when I’m up and around again?”
“Maybe there’s blue norther in hell tonight,” Ann replied with a laugh that strained to be light. “Right now all you’ve got to do is get your rest. The Haskells are my problem, and I know how to deal with them.”
Sands offered no protest. He was still weak and these few minutes of conversation had left him drained. Nestling down beneath the comforter, he glanced back at Ann who once more stood sentry at the window. He owed this angel of the swamps his life. If there were any way possible, he’d see that the debt was repaid in kind. Ann was one Sharp Tye Haskell would be cheated of.
Sands closed his eyes and let the weariness of his body drag him downward into sleep, away from thoughts of Ann Sharp and Tye Haskell, of Dub Ferris and a killer called Cotton Blue, and away from an accused murderer named Beau Dupree awaiting trial in Louisiana.
Chapter Six
The light of a full moon filtered through the cypress maze to illuminate the swamp in pale silver and shifting shadows. Sands stood at the window of Ann Sharp’s cabin, staring at the eerie landscape painted by the moon.
A wave of gooseflesh prickled over his skin. The world beyond the solid wall of logs and mud suddenly appeared estranged and unreal. It was as though while he stood guard, his mind rehashing all that had occurred the past month, an artist, lost in a laudanum nightmare, had crept forth with brush in hand and had vividly portrayed on canvas the terrors torturing his mind. The result was the swamp.
A hint of a smile moved over the ranger’s lips. The night, the waiting, and the constant chorus of sounds coming from the swamp were getting to him, sending his imagination off on flights of dark fantasy. The moonlit scene beyond the window was quite real and acrawl with death for a man who was foolish enough to forget where he was for one moment.
If the gators don’t get ya, then the water moccasins will.
The words to a Cajun fiddle song rolled over in his mind. With a lovely partner in arm, dancing in wide, skirt-lifting circles, he had never paid the words any heed. Now, their meaning was oh so clear.
Although it wasn’t reptilian visitors he worried about crawling up from the swamp. Two nights ago, while Ann stood sentry and he slept, a shot had been fired into the cabin. No alligator or moccasin had pulled the trigger.
“Just a reminder from ol’ man Tye that he and his boys are still around,” Ann had said lightly, trying to hide the lines of worry on her face with a strained smile.
Sands glanced into the cabin’s dark interior. Barely visible in the moonlight was a Colonial Doll quilt hung from a rope that stretched from one side of the cabin to the other. From the other side of that makeshift barrier of privacy, he heard the gentle rhythm of Ann’s breathing as she slept.
With one of her pa’s pistols tucked beneath her pillow ... just in case I should forget myself. Sands smiled; Ann’s virtue was safe with him. Since his return to consciousness a week ago, he had been more concerned about regaining the strength of his arms, legs, and back than dallying between t
he sheets with his beautiful angel of the swamp.
Although, he admitted, he had wondered about the alluring and very feminine curves hidden beneath Ann’s homespun shirts and doeskin breeches on more than one occasion these last couple of days. With a young woman as bountifully endowed as Ann Sharp so near, it was difficult not to wonder. And damned hard to keep one’s eyes averted when she walked to the end of the pier in front of the cabin each morning to shed her clothing and slip into the water for her daily bath.
Of course, either her rifle or one of her father’s pistols was perched close at hand on the edge of the pier should he decide to wander out of the cabin for a closer look at her unveiled charms. Nor did Sands doubt that Ann could and would use any of her pa’s old weapons should the need arise.
He turned away from the quilt and looked back out the window. A touch of embarrassment warmed his cheeks as he stared out onto the quiet scene of cypress and water. He had let his imagination run wild moments ago when he had seen the swamp as some artist’s nightmare. How could he have seen anything so quiet as ...
Quiet!
Sands reached for Ann’s rifle that leaned against the wall beside him. Seconds ago the swamp had been filled with sounds. Now there was only silence—an unnatural silence. Something, or someone had quieted the voices of the swamp.
Cocking the rifle’s hammer with a thumb, Sands quietly moved from the window and edged to the cabin’s door, carefully positioning himself at its side. He listened, heard nothing outside, then raised the door’s wooden latch. Still nothing. Pulling the door open an inch or two, he paused and listened again. The swamp remained quiet, too quiet.
The creak of rusting hinges came from the door as he pulled it farther back; the sound was like a scream in the stillness. He glanced back at the quilt barrier. Ann’s gentle, rhythmic breathing still came from behind it. He had no desire to wake the young woman, especially for something that might be nothing more than his own imagination.
Lifting the rifle, Sands’ attention returned to the door. Wedging the toe of his boot into the open crack, he shoved with his foot. The door swung inward.
And was answered by a yellow-blue flash and the explosive report of a rifle.
Lead bit into the flatboard door. A spray of splinters showered Sands’ neck, their needlelike points embedding themselves in his flesh.
Ignoring the warm, wet trickle that oozed from his neck, he swung the rifle barrel out, caught the edge of the door, and slammed it shut. Another ball of lead plowed through the flat boards at stomach height as he flipped the latch closed. A surprised whistle escaped his lips. Had he been standing in front of the door, he would now be lying on the cabin’s packed earth floor, dying.
A scurry of feet came from behind the ranger. He pivoted to see Ann yank down the quilt. With eyes wide, she stared at him, although the brace of pistols held in her hands told Sands she already had the answer to the unspoken question in her startled face. As did her reaction: pistols leveled for action, she stepped toward the window and pressed her back flat against the wall beside it.
“I can’t see anything,” she whispered to Sands.
“At least one of them is out by the pier,” he answered. “I saw the flame from his barrel.”
Ann edged closer to the window and peered out. “Still can’t see—”
“Cotton Blue!” a voice that rumbled like the bellow of a bull alligator called from outside. “I know you’re in there!”
“Tye Haskell.” Ann identified the voice for Sands.
“My boys have been watching and have seen you movin’ around in the cabin,” Haskell continued. “Why don’t you make it easy on yourself, Sharp? Just come on out. Make it quick and easy. We got no fight with the girl. It’s you we want. Come out, and we’ll let her live.”
Tye Haskell wasn’t much of a liar. Even with a log wall between him and the man, Sands heard the deception in his voice. The man had no intention of letting Ann live after he had killed her brother.
The problem was: Cotton Blue wasn’t in the cabin. “Think talking with him will do any good?” Ann said with a snort of disgust, reminding Sands of the suggestion he had made when he first regained consciousness. “The old man’s crazy. All he’s interested in is Sharp blood!”
“Cotton Blue, either you come out or we’ll burn you out!” Haskell bellowed. “Lead or fire, the choice is yours!”
“I can see a torch out there.” Ann lifted one of her single-shot pistols and took aim.
“Don’t shoot!” Sands shouted. Ann’s head jerked around, her eyes narrowing. “If they use a torch, we don’t stand a chance. This place will go up in flames in a matter of seconds.”
“What do you have in mind? Just standing there and letting them use that torch?” Ann’s voice was sharp with anger and fear.
Sands answered by lifting the latch and edging the door inward again. “Tye, Tye Haskell, this is Josh Sands, a Texas Ranger out of San Antonio. The man you’re looking for isn’t here. Cotton Sharp isn’t—”
“I ain’t listenin’ to no bullshit!” Haskell roared. “Either you come out or I’ll have my boys throw their torches!”
“Haskell, the only shit you’ll be in is when every ranger in the republic comes down on this swamp after your hide!” Sands called back, easing himself forward just enough to peer outside. He saw them now, five men and five torches. “The rangers don’t take kindly to having one of their own murdered.”
“Ranger from San Antonio! What do you take me for?” Haskell called back.
“Pa, listen,” another voice came from out of the night. “That ain’t Cotton Blue! Cotton’s voice is lower, meaner.”
Sands heard Haskell answer the voice in a muted grumble, which was followed by an exchange of indiscernible mutterings. Then there was a long, heavy silence, but the torches remained where they were, and there was no more gunfire.
“Every one of them is out there,” Ann said. “Ol’ man Tye, Frank, Billy Ray, Sims, and Charlie—I heard all of them, arguing like a bunch of buzzards over the carcass of a dead skunk. We should—”
“All right, Mr. Texas Ranger,” Haskell yelled out, cutting Ann off. “You’ve convinced my boys that you’re who you say you are, but not me. I gotta see you with my own eyes ’fore I’ll believe.”
“You don’t believe I’m going to step outside with you and your sons training your guns on me, do you?” Sands called back, ignoring Ann’s glaring eyes.
“Meet you halfway down the pier,” Haskell answered after another prolonged silence. “I’m tossing down my rifle and starting up the pier. You do the same.”
Sands turned to Ann. “Take this.” He tossed her the rifle when he heard the clunk of Haskell’s weapon as it dropped to the pier. The old man, with torch in hand, walked toward the cabin.
“You aren’t going out there, are you?” Ann’s words were filled with disbelief, as was her expression.
“No other choice,” Sands answered with a nod. “Keep me covered. If there’s trouble, make a break through the window and run for the swamp. At least there you’ll have a chance.”
He didn’t wait for her answer, but stepped through the cabin door with his hands held high. The expected death-dealing slam of lead into his chest didn’t come. Only cold sweat prickled over his body as he walked from the cabin toward the pier and Tye Haskell.
“You’re damned lucky, Mr. Ranger, that my boys were right,” Haskell said in a low growl as he stopped before Sands with torch held high. “I’m a God-fearin’ man, wouldn’t want the blood of an innocent man on my hands.” Haskell turned back to his sons and called out, “Lay down your rifles. This ain’t Cotton Blue.”
Haskell’s face was as hard as his voice. Deep wrinkles, like the cracks of untreated buffalo hide, slashed across his forehead and radiated from the corners of his eyes and mouth—dark creases etched there from his permanent scowl. Tufts of thin white hair poked out from under a moth-eaten hat that had seen the end of its useful life at least a decade ago. Tye
’s overalls had been attacked by the same moth, as had been the top portion of the red long-handles he wore in lieu of a shirt.
Sands could barely see the old man’s four sons waiting behind him at the end of the pier in their flat bottom boats. From what he could make out, they dressed and looked like their father, only younger.
“But you won’t be so lucky next time, ranger or not.” Haskell squinted at him in the harsh light of the torch. “Them that takes up with Sharps might as well be Sharps as far as I’m concerned.”
“Haskell, you’re making a big mistake.” Sands quickly explained how he had come to Ann Sharp’s cabin. The words were wasted. Haskell’s cold expression remained unchanged.
“Like I said, you’ve been damned lucky this night,” Haskell answered when Sands finished. “If I was you, I’d pack up and git the hell out of these swamps at sunup tomorrow. Another night here and you might not be so lucky.”
Haskell had said his piece, and there was nothing Sands could say to change the man’s mind. Instead he watched Haskell turn and walk back to his sons. The old man stopped to scoop his rifle up from the pier before he lowered himself into one of the four flat bottom boats waiting for him.
“Take heed, Mr. Ranger,” Haskell called back as his sons poled the boats out into the swamp. “Don’t let another night catch you in that cabin.”
Silently, Sands watched the three boats quietly vanish in the maze of cypress trees. He had no intention of spending another night in this swamp—nor would he allow Ann to remain here.
Turning, he stalked back to the cabin, his mind churning with the seed of a plan. If he wanted to get Ann out with him, they had to make their move tonight. In the morning it would be too late.